Having narrowly escaped with his life, Yang Kai's face was pale. He felt something sticky beneath his nose and raised a hand to wipe it, only to find his palm drenched in blood.
Though he had successfully fled, recalling what he had just experienced still sent a chill through him. A single question lingered deep in his heart: who exactly had fought the Time Great Emperor to the death all those years ago? One had to remember that the Time Great Emperor had stood at the very pinnacle of the entire Star Boundary. Even the other Great Emperors could only look up to him—much as the Devouring Great Emperor Wu Kuang differed from his contemporaries, the Time Great Emperor may have surpassed even that.
His opponent in that life-and-death battle must surely have reached the same level.
Could it be... the legendary Great Demon God?
Yang Kai's brows knitted tight. The first time he had learned of the title "Great Demon God" was within the Thousand Illusion Dream, when he had marched with the Barbarian Clan across the land, fighting the Demon Race in mortal combat. At the final moment, the Evergreen Divine Tree had sacrificed itself to seal the rift between the two realms—and through that rift, an earth-shattering palm had struck from the void, nearly undoing all of Qing's efforts.
Everything within the Thousand Illusion Dream had been conjured from real events that had taken place in various eras. The ancient war between the Barbarian Clan and the Demon Race had truly existed, though the course of events was certainly different from what Yang Kai had experienced. But if the Thousand Illusion Dream had depicted the Great Demon God's palm strike, then it proved that the Great Demon God had indeed existed in that age.
Later, Yang Kai had feigned injury and entered the Demon Domain alongside Yu Rumeng. He had asked her about the Great Demon God, but the moment he uttered those words, her expression changed drastically. She warned him never to speak of those three characters again.
In the Demon Domain, those three words seemed to be taboo!
After that, Yang Kai had neglected to investigate any further. During his years in the Demon Domain, he had never once heard anyone mention the Great Demon God. The most powerful beings there were the twelve Demon Saints, plus the master of the Hundred Spirits Continent, the Dragon Demon Chang Tian.
It was only today that suspicion finally took root in Yang Kai's mind.
If the one who had fought the Time Great Emperor back then had indeed been the Great Demon God, then it all made sense.
But judging from the current outcome, the Time Great Emperor had perished body and soul after that battle—and the Great Demon God likely had not fared much better. Otherwise, there would have been no reason for him to remain completely silent for all these millennia.
As his thoughts churned, countless possibilities flashed through his mind. Moments later, Yang Kai paused, letting out a soft exclamation as he carefully probed his own memories.
Although he had spent the past dozen or so days inside the ancient battlefield, his mind immersed within it with little attention paid to his physical body, the body itself was a peculiar existence with its own capacity for memory. Neglecting it in the moment did not mean one couldn't perceive what had happened afterward—even ordinary people possessed that ability, let alone Yang Kai, who had achieved considerable Cultivation.
When his emotions had been in turmoil earlier, he hadn't noticed anything. But now, almost by accident, he discovered something fascinating: his Spiritual Soul had spent more than a decade inside the ancient battlefield, yet his physical body outside had spent less than half an hour.
In other words, the flow of time inside the ancient battlefield was many times faster than normal.
Yang Kai had experienced this before. Not only him—Yang Xiao and Yang Xue had benefited from it as well.
The two children had been only a few years old when they followed Qiongqi into the Time Divine Temple. But several years later, when Yang Kai went to find them, they had already grown into adults, both having reached the Emperor Realm. Upon inquiry, he learned that the two little ones had been Cultivating inside the Time Divine Temple for several hundred years.
That was the Time Great Emperor's legacy. Within a certain forbidden area inside the temple, the power of time was so dense that its flow differed vastly from the outside world, allowing Yang Xiao and Yang Xue to live through several hundred years in just a few short years. They had not only grown up, but their cultivation had also become remarkably advanced.
However, that Great Emperor's legacy could not be sustained indefinitely. Once it was depleted, it would cease to exist. Even though Yang Xiao and Yang Xue had now inherited the Time Great Emperor's mantle and obtained the Time Divine Temple as a treasure, they would find it difficult to recreate that former glory—unless the two could reach the Time Great Emperor's level and achieve profound mastery in the Dao of the Time Law.
It was likely a parting gift that the Time Great Emperor had deliberately left for his successor.
When Yang Kai had first learned of this, he had been genuinely happy for them—while also feeling an intense pang of envy.
From the day he had embarked upon the path of Cultivation until now, he had been at it for barely over a hundred years. If he were truly given another few hundred years, he dared not speak of anything else, but reaching the Pseudo-Emperor Realm would be a certainty. As for the Great Emperor Realm—that was out of the question. The Great Emperor Realm could not be achieved through bitter Cultivation alone; it required an entirely different kind of fortune.
But even Pseudo-Emperor would be a tremendous help to his current situation. With his Upper-Rank Demon King cultivation, he could already trade blows with Pseudo-Emperors. If he truly ascended to Pseudo-Emperor, he would likely possess the strength to face even a Demon Saint in battle!
Never in his wildest dreams had he imagined that such good fortune would one day land squarely on his head.
Gundam had devoured—he had no idea which continent it had been. If he had known beforehand, Yang Kai would have devoured that continent himself without hesitation. Now, after more than a decade, his strength would have surely undergone an earth-shattering transformation.
For a moment, he was nearly overwhelmed with elation.
But that wasn't the only piece of good news. Even as his emotions continued to roil, he suddenly sensed that his Spiritual Soul had grown more solid and resilient. And within his Spiritual Sea, something new had faintly appeared.